The next moment Millicent was alarmed, terribly frightened. She was in Michael's arms. He was crushing her, crushing her to atoms. It was not a lover's embrace; it was the mad fury of a roused mystic. Would he crush her until he killed her?
"Don't, Mike, you'll choke me! You are choking me now. Do you want to kill me?"
"I could," he said. "And I'd like to!" He flung her from him on the soft sand. "Go away," he said. "Leave me and my camp for good and all!" His words were broken, mere breathless ejaculations. His eyes made a coward of the reckless woman, but she collected her quick wits.
She lay where he had flung her. She was not hurt or even stunned, but she knew that if she lay there in the position in which he had flung her, presently he would come to her and ask her if he had been too brutal. She traded on his tenderness to women, his horror of inflicting pain.
She lay motionless, the blue sky above her, the yellow sands stretching to the far-off horizon. She had tempted him willingly, deliberately. Something had compelled her to test her power. Her annoyance at his apparent indifference to her presence had become too poignant to hide any longer. Anger was exhausting her nerves. She was conscious that she had burnt her boats, that her tactics were at fault.
Michael did not look at her. He was conscious of nothing in the world but an unbearable contempt for his own manhood. Why had he not driven her away long before this? Why had he silently acquiesced to her companionship?
Despising her as he did, why was she able to lower him in his own eyes? Why did he tolerate her? Why had she any qualities which appealed to him? Why, oh why was she just what she was? He hated her at the moment, but he hated himself still more. When they got back to the camp he would tell Hassan that their ways must lie apart. And now, at this very instant, he would go and tell her that she must leave; he must have it out with her.
He went to her and stooped over her. "Millicent," he said, "I want to speak to you."
"Yes, Mike."
"Get up and look at me. I want you to listen."